Galaxy of Pain
by StarMaker674
Summary: A fusion of ME and 40K universes , different in many ways but one thing remains: in the grim darkness of the far future there's only war to the laughter of thirsting gods.
1. Intro into a dark universe

**Hello,**

 **This is a fusion universe I have been working on for a time now. This is a setting with elements from both Game's workshop Warhammer 40K and BioWare's mass effect universe though it would unrecognisable from both as it continues. This fic will mostly be in the format of a historical narrative as to cover the scope of events occurring kinda like "shape of the nightmare to come " but anyone is free to use this setting for their own stories. Anyways one thing I want to make clear is that humans are completely absent from the setting. No Terra, no emperor and no imperium, this is partially to curb my own HFY leanings and because they do not really fit the universe I am creating.**

 **Big thanks to HongCong for betareading this**

 **Without further ado, enjoy:**

It's the 41st millennium and the galaxy burns in the fires of war. Galactic empires both ancient and newly risen fight in an endless brutal conflict for supremacy in an uncaring galaxy as the Thirsting Gods laugh.

The Eldar race, whose empire once stretched across the galaxy and to whom the very stars once bowed to, now barley clings to existence as they tether ever closer to extinction and into the waiting jaws of she who thirsts.

The Exodite suffer as the younger races gaze upon their fertile worlds with hunger in their eyes and claim them as their own, killing or enslaving their inhabitants and enslaving world spirits to their will.

The Craftworlds take refuge in the Webway where most races cannot follow them. Unfortunately for them, their domain is invaded by their ancient rivals the protheans whose own empire has collapsed from numerous servant race uprisings and the wars with the endless mechanical horrors of both the Zha'til and Metacons. Now, the four eyed aliens fight to take control of the Eldar's intergalactic network and refashion a new prothean empire from the cold lifeless husks of the Eldar.

The Dark Eldar fared little better as their realm of Commorragh was sacked by a massive assault by the vengeful protheans who blasted the dark city into ruin and slaughtered the ancient noble families, taking the Dark City as their own. The surviving Dark Eldar fled in droves into real space. They would have died had it not been for a bargain made with Warlord Okeer. Now they roam the galaxy in massive flesh arks of misery and torment, a twisted parody of the majestic Craftworlds.

The Primordial Annihilator stirs in the empyrean. Chaos cults rise on millions of worlds like weeds and bring anarchy and suffering wherever they are. The eye of terror has become a haven for a sorts of rogue militaries, mad scientists and powerful psykers. There they fight and prey on one another, though it's not unusual for them to unite for massive raids into the materium. These black Crusades strike fear into the hearts of billions

The Batarians have long embraced the path of chaos and now their dark imperium serves the desires of the hellish warp entities. The batarians are known to attack swiftly and without mercy, taking untold millions of slaves in the dreaded hulls of the black ships. The fate of these souls is never pleasant and the agonies they go through is enough to make a dark eldar pale.

From the galactic east on the silver planet the Turians rise, their massive war machine grinding any who oppose the reunification crusade into dust. Their armies are composed of the mighty Legio Titanus, super soldiers bred for war and on their head is the primarchs, meta-Turians who are said to never lose a battle or war. The Hierarchy will bring order to the chaotic galaxy and no cost is too high, only through obedience to their betters can the turians survive. The Turians military might ensured that none can survive their onslaught.

None, save for the Quarians. The enigmatic species have been content to remain beyond the Perseus veil but the Turians had sought to claim their rare dextro-amino worlds and mineral rich systems for their own. Declaring war on the children of Rannoch, the full might of five Hierarchy fleets soon moved into the system to claim it for the glory of Palaven.

But the quarians had other plans and their advanced technology proved to be more than a match for the Turians. Alongside them fought the Geth, a synthetic race of swarm intelligences who were unflinchingly loyal to their creators, who returned the favour. Despite that the Hierarchy pushed onwards through sheer attrition and the Quarians and Geth, in the end strip mining their home systems to build their now infamous Migrant fleet and deprive their conquerors of any resources before fleeing. The Quarians and their children now roam the galaxy, their goals unknown for no one is ever allowed into their ships and live.

Two of the most technologically advanced civilizations: the Salarians and the Tau, have warred against each other for hundreds of years and locked in an ever increasing arms race as each side develops more magnificent and destructive engines of war in an effort to break the seemingly eternal stalemate, the Salarians refusing to bow before an upstart race and the Tau desiring to subjugate all species into their empire.

The perverted, arrogant, yet charming and beautiful Asari are spread across a thousand planets, their republics only held together through the threat of extinction posed by other species and the will of Athame, the Mother Empress of the Asari and the mistress of the galaxy. The daughters of Athame only survive through a mix of brutal politicking, trickery and their bio/psyker powers. To them, each worthy asari life is a precious thing and are willing to lay entire species to ruin to save one of them

The green skins rise in numbers as Ork WAAAGGHHHs increase both in number and ferocity, uncaring of who they fight for the Orks merely crave war no matter their opponents. More worryingly, more and more Orks are gathering in the Alarakh system where they and the Krogan have fought in an increasingly punishing conflict. There, the great Warlord Urdnot Wrex fights the mighty Ork Warboss Ghazkull himself.

Of the Krogan, they remain tenacious as ever, holding on to their territory through sheer numbers and brutality, the Genophage strengthening them instead of destroying them. The genetic bio plague merely drove the Krogan to evolve faster and grow even more powerful. Their battle bands roam the galaxy in search for glory and victory.

The Rachni rise from the coldness of extinction and once again threaten the galaxy with their endless swarms spread like a flood, all for their desire to silence a galaxy of unbearable sour notes.

The Necrons awaken from their slumber and look upon their galaxy in hatred as they see it infested with lesser races.

The Terminus systems as always remain in strife. Pirates, mercenaries, and warbands all take shelter in the lawlessness of these parts, there they hide amongst a thousand minor species united only in their hatred of everyone else.

Far worse than all that, two unknownable enemies arrive in the galaxy. One a swarm of flesh and ravenous unending hunger. The other, a fleet of cold metal and silence.

The Dark millennium is upon us and the galaxy is a twisted mosaic woven by the spindle of fate into a massive never ending nightmare that none can awaken from.


	2. The War in Heaven

**_Big thanks to solarblaster for betareading_**

 ** _The dominion of the Old Ones_**

In the primordial times, long before the birth of the primordial annihilator and the warp became a raging inferno of insanity and extreme emotions; the first species to achieve intelligence (besides the terrible Star Gods ) were the Old Ones.

The Old Ones came to dominate the galaxy through their advanced technology and psychic might. Indeed some theorise that the reptilian species had completely transcended the shackles of the materium and became a race of pure warp energy though some dispute this.

Nevertheless the Old Ones ruled over all life for untold eons and built many wonders, most well known of their constructs is the Webway ( despite the eldar claiming credit for its making). The complex portal network serving to ensure swift space travel without the need for the fickle tides of the warp.

The Old Ines empire reached its apex 60 million years ago

But the Old Ones were not the only species in the galaxy. From a planet constantly bathed in the destructive energies from its baleful Star rose the Necrontyr.

The Necrontyr suffered from cancerous growths and other terrifying alignments from ionizing solar winds and radiation storms, this made the necrons lives short and filled with torment and suffering. They became a morbid people, building grandiose monuments to their dead with the living being but passing shades and spent most of their existence preparing for the inevitability of their death.

Many have wondered why the necrontyr hadn't been biologically adapted for the hostile environment of their planet. Some theorised the necrontyr were not actually native to the planet originally but no one can provide an answer as to how they got there.

Nevertheless, In order to stave off extinction and out of a desire to realize their true potential elsewhere, the Necrontyr escaped from their cursed world through any means necessary. Using their stasis crypts and relatively slow antimatter ships they blindly crept into the galaxy and slowly their dominion came to encompass much of the known galaxy and the Necrontyr empire was born. Ruled by a Silent King; who rules through his triarchs; who are in turn subordinated by the various Phaeron dynasties.

It was only a matter of time before the Necrontyr, who had grown arrogant and fractious encountered the Old Ones. The meeting was shocking to the nihilistic necrontyr, here was a race that enjoyed immortality while the necrontyr had their lives cut short.

The Necrontyr demanded that they be given the secret to eternal life, for hadn't the Necrontyr risen above their hardships into the void and proven worthy to join the immortals?

But the Old Ones politely but firmly refused. They said that, while the achievements of the young race could not be denied and earned them respect from the first race, they also had proven to be neither wise nor mature enough to properly use such powers.

Considering the Necrontyr had already succumbed to massive infighting between the numerous dynasties in a series of devastating civil wars known as the Wars of succession , the Old Ones were correct in their assessment. But the necrontyr in their hatred saw it as arrogance and felt they were left to rot.

Taking advantage of this resentment, the last of the Silent Kings, Szarekh declared war on the First race for only they could pose a threat to the powerful Necrontyr Empire. The pretext was the refusal of the Old Ones to share the secrets of immortality and leaving the Necrontyr to fester and die . The real reason-some argue- was to create a common enemy to unite the squabbling dynasties under one banner. I doubt even the great Old Ones could have predicted the disastrous results of the coming conflict. The War in Heaven had started and the galaxy would suffer.

The Necrontyr empire had the advantage of surprise at first, and managed to set entire systems aflame but the Old Ones had the advantage in terms of space travel ; the Webway allowing them instantaneous travel to anywhere in the galaxy while the Necrontyr were restricted to slow antimatter torch ships. Though the Necrontyr possessed superior technology they were constantly outmaneuvered and in time were defeated.

The Old Ones retribution was swift and the necrontyr soon found themselves losing the war they started and far from uniting them, the opposite had occurred.

In the face of defeat, the always fragile unity of the Necrontyr began to fracture once more. No longer did the prospect of a common enemy have any hOld over the disparate dynasties. Thus began the second iteration of the Wars of Secession, more destructive than the first wars.

Soon the Necrontyr were pushed back to the cOld hateful embrace of their terrible homeworld on the edges of the Halo rim. The Old Ones could have destroyed them but the first race were creators first having seeded life throughout the Milky Way. They could not conceive the thought of utterly erasing any life form no matter how wretched.

And so the Necrontyr were imprisoned on the very place they sought to escape. Their anger at the Old Ones cooled over the centuries into a freezing hatred and resentment of all life. While the decision of the Elder species might seem naive and foolish to us now : the Necrontyr at the time were utterly beaten and their empire shattered and they would have stayed that way ; trapped by their own toxic mindset and reduced to a mere footnote in galactic history had it not been for a twist of fate .

 ** _The Star Gods rise_**

For millions of years the Necrontyr sought to understand the workings of their sun that caused them so much suffering and misery. After their confinement they sought to create a super weapon that could allow them to turn the tide in their favor.

They finally found their quarry when they discovered entities of pure energy that fed on the energies of the star of the Necrontyr homeworld- and may have caused it become so destructive in the first place.

Accounts are varied and contradictory on how the first contact occurred but however it occurred, the discovery would have a profound effect on the Necrontyr. One that would soon give cause for the entirety of the galaxy to quake in fear. And for a long, long time afterwards leave the broken survivors to claw at their sanity at the sight of the things the war would create, in all their stultifying hideousness.

The power of these star-born creatures was incredible, the raw energy of the stars made animate, and the Necrontyr called them the C'tan or "Star Gods" in their own tongue out of the belief that they were the long lost progeny of their ancient death god. When some sought to curry favor with these god like beings by forging them bodies made of Necrodermis or living metal as it is more popularly known : the C'tan played along the deception taking the forms of ancient gods from ancient half forgotten myths.

Soon the the C'tan began exploring the material universe with their newfound physical bodies and as they focused their consciousness into this new realm of existence, they came to appreciate the pleasures available to beings of matter.

Chief amongst the things they felt was a hunger unlike anything they felt before. A desire sated only by the deliciously focused trickles of electromagnetic energy given off by the physical bodies of the tastes much better than nourishing but tasteless Star matter they used to feed on.

And so one day a C'tan, known amongst its kin as the Deciever appeared before the Silent King and explained the supposed origins of his species. He claimed that his species were the true first life in existence, not the Old Ones. The Deciever then recounted how they sought to usurp the C'tan in a war that saw the C'tan fall from grace and go into hiding, waiting for worthy allies to emerge. How much of this is actually true is impossible to know for the Deceiver himself might have believed his own lies so used was he to treachery and lies. No matter the truth of it what is known is that the Star God promised the Necrontyr all they desired in exchange for their help.

Unity could be theirs once again, and the immortality that they had sought for so long would finally be within their grasp. No price would there be for these great gifts, the Deceiver insisted, for they were but boons to be bestowed upon valued allies.

The offer seemed too good to be true and the Necrontyr were eager to accept. The only dissident was a lone cosmologist who foretOld that acceptance of the deal would being about an age of glory but at the cost of the very soul of the species.

But he was ignored and the pact was sealed between Gods and mortals.

 _ **The Birth of the Necrons**_

"When the Silent King saw what had been done, he knew at last the true nature of the C'tan, and of the doom they had wrought in his name".

Excerpt from the Book of Mournful Night

The C'tan seemed to fulfill their end of the bargain, granting their new "allies " incredible technologies , chief among them was a new system of FTL that at last allowed the newly resurgent necrontyr to match their hated enemies in the void.

The war was renewed and the necrontyr, armed with titanic war machines and their new warships, took the galaxy by surprise and proceeded to rebuild their empire larger than before while the Old Ones reeled from the sudden uprising. Before the true war can begin however the vampiric gods had one last gift to bestow on their subjects.

Colossal cyclopean bio-furnaces built by Necrontyr artifice roared day and night, and into these the Silent King's peoples marched according to the terms of the pact he had made with the C'tan. The Great Biotransference had begun and untold numbers of Necrontyr marched into the furnaces where their souls were torn out and feasted upon by the C'tan. Their frail bodies were destroyed and whatever remained of themselves was forced into bodies of living metal; not unlike their vampiric deities.

The Silent King was the last to undergo the process and when it was completed only then did he realise hehad been tricked. His people had been reduced to mindless drones moved only by the will of the Necron lords, who were the only to retain any individuality, the unity they craved was granted through absolute tyranny not through free will. They were finally freed from the fleshy prisons that were their body and gained new nearly indestructible ones and in return lost their souls and were filled with crushing emptiness. And so the Necrontyr were reborn as the terrible Necrons.

The Silent King honoured his end of the bargain but silently vowed revenge on those who destroyed his race but first the Old Ones would die for the lengths they forced him to go through.

 ** _The End of the Old Ones and the beginning of chaos_**

And so they did as the full might of the newborn Necrons and their mechanical horrors were unleashed upon them. Bastion after bastion fell to the deathless legions as the Old Ones were exterminated and the Vampiric metal gods feasted upon the delectable souls of the first masters of the galaxy, their life essence infinitely more rich than the dim souls of the extinct necrontyr.

The Old Ones, despite their legendary patience and willpower, were driven to desperation and resorted to creating powerful psychic warrior races to capitalize on the one weakness of the necrons and their C'tan masters , their vulnerability to warp based powers.

The first species crafted were the arthropodic Protheans. The four eyed species were supremely effective soldiers thanks to a sort of proto-WAAGGGHHH! field that allowed them to coordinate and strategize on a galactic scale and proved adept at holding the metal tides at bay. Unfortunately for them, the necrons adapted to their tactics and even found a way to disrupt the connection between protheans leaving entire armies stranded and easy pickings.

The Old Ones deemed the protheans failures and would go on to create other more psychically and physically powerful races such as the Aeldari, the Krorks, Hrud and many more. As for the Protheans, their numbers whittled down by years of warfare (unlike many of their successors, protheans did not breed explosively ), they were rounded up and confined to a single planet. Why the Old Ones did that is unknown but the protheans saw it as abandonment. However perhaps there was a greater reasoning for the decision for it was on this world that the Protheans would discover the basis of their empire, Eezo.

The Old Ones new servant races proved far more effective in combating the silver sentinels. The Aeldari's mastery over the powers of the immaterium where second only to their creators and exploited the necrons weakness to psychic powers to great effect. To combat the Star Gods they created their own pantheon, the now all but extinct Eldar Gods. These warp constructs proved able to face the dreaded death gods head on.

The fungoid krorks were able to match the necrons in numbers and outmatch them in sheer firepower. Their reality bending WAAAAGGGHHH! field made them formidable to face in battle.

Unfortunately this proved to not enough in the end as the C'tan Nyadra'zath, the Burning One, who in his desire to spread his fires of eldritch power, showed the necrons a way to breach the Webway through a series of living stone portals known as Dolmen Gates. With the greatest advantage of their enemies nullified; the Necrons gained the upper hand and the last holdouts of the ancient race were slowly whittled down and exterminated. But the end of the reptilian species would not come at the hands of the necrons but at the hands of something far more insidious.

The War in Heaven truly earned its title, when its end drew near trillions had died, thousands of systems were reduced to naught but ashes and an innumerable number of lesser species annihilated from existence. All of these events naturally were reflected in the immaterium which was flooded by all the devastation and death. Emotions swirled and twisted by the malign influences of all the suffering inflicted in the conflict. Fear, hatred, paranoia and cruelty coalesced in a torrent of terror as the sea of souls became enraged and turbulent. From these paradoxically contradictory energies; the first warp predators and daemons were born. The most fearsome among them were the Enslaver leviathans.

These colossal beings born from the last thoughts and dreams sought to escape the confines of the warp and did so by dominating the minds of the psykers of young races and transmuted the possessed bodies into portals from which they poured into the materium. The leviathan enslavers thrived and dominated on many of the younger races.

This proved the final nail in the coffin of the Old Ones. Beset by both the necrons and these new monstrosities, they were finally defeated, destroyed and scattered. Whether they went extinct or sought refuge in another galaxy is unknown.

 _ **The shattering of the C'tan**_

Throughout the war, Szarekh patiently bided his time for the instant where the C'tan would be vulnerable. Though he controlled the entirety of the necron race, he could not face the C'tan whose power was at its zenith. Instead he struck after the Old Ones were finally beaten and the C'tan descended into infighting without any worthy foes to fight. The Silent King built engines of awesome power that focused the might of the Material universe and struck the C'tan (who in their arrogance did not foresee this until it was too late. Though they could not be really destroyed for they were fundamental aspects of existence instead they were shattered into thousands of shards each bound in Tesseract labyrinths. Millions of necrons died in the rebillion and the Triarchs were all eliminated leaving the Silent King himself to rule the Necrons directly . But in the end their fate was once again in their hands.

 _ **The Great Sleep**_

The necrons emerged victorious from the apocalyptic conflicts and were vindicated in their pursuit of mastery of the physical plane of existence but it was a bitter victory. They were severely weakened from their overthrowing the Star Gods and the Aeldari, who survived their Old One masters and were poised to dominate the galaxy and more importantly despised the necrons. And far worse were the new enslavers who dominated both materium and immaterium and whose incredible will held billions to their sway. The Silent Monarch instead of fighting those two equally terrible foes, ordered the necrons to retreat into their tomb world and enter a state of slumber until myriad foes had destroyed each other leaving the galaxy ripe for the taking.

Once the last Tomb world went dormant the Szarekh destroyed the command protocols that he used for so long. He had utterly failed his people and was undeserving of leading them. He then turned his back on the galaxy and went on an intergalactic voyage of penance.

However while the deathless ones slept the galaxy would know no peace in the meantime.


	3. Of Alderai and Leviathans

The War in Heaven had ended with the galaxy in shambles as warp-born horrors and the out of control bioweapons of the Old Ones fought for galactic domination. Admit the chaos two factions were arisen : the psychically gifted Aldarei and the mighty leviathan enslavers (who from this point shall be referred to as simply "Leviathans" ) .

The Aldarei while deprived of their masters, had retained much of their creators technology. Seeing themselves as their rightful inheritors, they sought to bring order to a chaotic galaxy, with them at the top of the new pecking order. The leviathans on the other hands had merely desired to be dominate and be worshipped as the Gods they are by their 'thrall species '.

Surprisingly unlike future chaos domains, the Leviathans rule was somewhat tolerable and some might even call benevolent (it mostly depended on the personality of the enslaver involved ).

For unlike the horrors that would come after, the deep ones were powered by cold logic and a desire for survival and thus did not desire chaos and destruction for its own sake, to them only power mattered how it was obtained was irrelevant.

Why the leviathans differ so much than all other creatures born of the madness of the warp is unknown perhaps even to the beings themselves and can only be speculated upon. Some theorize that this is a result of the leviathans being the first warp predators and emerging when the warp was relatively calm (or at least less chaotic ) than in the terrible years to come making them more stable. The truth, which would be discovered in aeon of terror, proved to be far worse and more insidious

It was not long before a large swath of the galaxy swore them allegiance if only for protection against the myriad horrors that stalked the galaxy, notably among them are the devolved Krorks now called orks; For without their masters and any Necrons to fight the greenskins turned against their former allies, for war and conflict built into their genetic code, forming the first of the terrible WAAHHGGGs that now infest most star sectors. For some reason the leviathans could not dominate or in any way influence the fungal species, perhaps the ork unique psychic field shielded their minds?

Nevertheless, the Aldarei seeing those who brought on the downfall of their creators spread across the galaxy like a plague, were insulted that these glorified warp predators dared call themselves the apex race. Not to mention that as psykers themselves, the knife ears were particularly vulnerable to the leviathan mind enthralment abilities (and indeed many an Eldar planet found themselves enslaved and made to fight against their kin ).

It was not long before a new galaxy shattering war broke out between the two species and once again the galaxy burned in the fires of an apocalyptic conflict. Thousands of species were extinguished, either by reprisal attacks for siding with one faction or simply caught in the crossfire, the callous titans above them not sparing them a second thought.

Untold armaments were unleashed by both sides ; the leviathans drew from the knowledge ripped out from the minds of the Old Ones ,whose minds they consumed, and crafted terrible weapons, from the subtle Dragon orbs and the nightmarish warp engines. The Alderai on the other hand utilised their complete mastery of warpcraft to bring forth untold nightmares from the veil.

This war which some had aptly described as the Second War in Heaven was as devastating as its namesake and served to depopulate the galaxy even more. But as the conflict dragged on the warp grew more and more unstable than it already was. It was during this time that the first daemons emerged and the beings that would later be known as the Chaos Gods began to take shape, though no one is exactly sure how any of them came to be aside from the Dark Prince : Slaanesh.

These proved to be a threat to the leviathans as the daemons hunted them down in their own habitat and incursions from the warp increased in frequency across leviathan holdings. This did not please the Deep Ones for daemon worlds could not be controlled by them and daemons made a habit of destroying their thrall races , reducing their tribute.

Fighting a war on both sides, the leviathans crafted a new weapon, using the combined knowledge of their servant races and their own, the nature of the weapon is unknown, what we know is that it was called "The Catalyst".

Soon afterwards with no warning, the Leviathans and all evidence they ever existed, vanished ; inexplicably. We only know of their existence from records said to have come from the Black Library itself and could not even begin to speculate what happened to them, though the most obvious solution is that they were hunted down to extinction by the newly arisen legions of hell or that the very weapon they created became their undoing.

The truth would be uncovered by the galaxy at a much later time and what a terrible time it was.

But for now, the Aldarei, were left to deal with the new threat of the daemons, who were naturally drawn to the luminous and powerful souls of the knife ears. The Aldarei found a solution in the warp constructs that formed from their collective consciousness. Originally made to fight the terrible C'tan they proved equally as adept at holding back the neverborn and preventing all but the very worst of chaos corruption.

And so with all their foes vanquished or at least held back, the knife ears were finally free to exert their rule over the galaxy, none could stand against them for their technology was second to none and their armies numerous as they were powerful. Soon their empire would encompass billions of worlds across thousands of light years, the greatest the galaxy had seen since the Old Ones themselves. Species either bent the knee or were eradicated from existence for refusing rightful submission to their betters either by the Aldreai themselves or the ork hordes that the Knife ears would allow to infest the offending system

But one species stood. For years they grew in the shadows and watched as the pretenders grew more decadent and prideful. For too long have they plotted and bided their time , like a predator waiting for the perfect moment to strike at its much stronger prey.

They were the Forgotten , the true firstborn and the rightful heirs to the Old Ones, They were the Protheans and the pretenders would pay for taking what was their's.


	4. Return of thr Firstborn

Return of the firstborn

For untold eons they remained forgotten. Discarded by their creators like a child tossing away an old toy in favor for a newer one. They were the real heirs to the old ones and for too long have they watched the false ones despoil their inheritance.

Excerpt from the prophecies of farseer Gra'ssex

After their supposed victory over the leviathans the eldar empire was at last uncontested by any other force in the galaxy. Their unfettered access to the webway allowed for them to rapidly expand until their core worlds encompassed a mind boggling 10000 light years space , that's without adding the untold number of outposts, maiden worlds and webway ports.

The eldar rule over the other races was fairly benevolent (or at the very least not actively malicious) ; So long as they swore allegiance to the eldar, paid tribute and didn't stir up any trouble they were allowed to do as they wished, in return they were protected from the never ending tide of the orks.

The greenskins had become a galactic infestation of immense proportions. Hundreds of planets moons and even asteroids became incubators for trillions of various orkoid organisms that would grow into WAGHHs of incalculable sizes. Some of these would even manage to fight off the Eldar extermination fleets and would prove to be a nuisance for the knife ears.

Still these were 'minor' skirmishes compared to the horrors of the War in Heaven and the enslaver conflict. The Galaxy was relatively at peace (at the very last it wasn't threatened with complete annihilation).

It was during this era that the eldar reached their apex but in their dominance they grew decedent. It is known that eldar experience emotions at a higher intensity than any species as a result of their greater connection to the warp. And the emotion most prevalent at the time was sheer inescapable boredom ; there was no enemy that wasn't easily defeated and broken, nor was there any need for tiresome labor( which was performed by machines ) .

Without anything else to fill the void in their souls the children of Isha turned to hedonism and depravity to fill the void in their souls. It started benign enough ,but slowly and gradually their activities become ever more callous and depraved.

Stars were stolen from their systems for the sheer barbaric amusement of watching races hopelessly die, depraved cults that catered to any twisted fantasy the knife ears could imagine and more, sprang up on every world where the knife ears lived. Very few eldar records survive from this era (though it would be more accurate to say that they are inaccessible as the remaining craftworlders jealously guard any lore they have left and it is doubtful any of these records survived the burning of the Dark City) but what we do have paints a terrible picture of the eldar empire.

However the eldar were being watched from the shadows. The Protheans, the rejected heirs of the Old Ones had watched as the unworthy vermin that replaced them defiled and twisted the galaxy that should have been rightfully theirs.

The Protheans had come a long way since they were abandoned and left to languish in obscurity on an unremarkable world, for they had been stripped of all technology and devolved to a primitive state. Eventually however they managed to claw their way back into civilization ; unfortunately as they began to reach out to the stars they faced a connedrum. Protheans were all psykers, not patcurialy strong but enough to allow them a psychic field , not unlike the orks, that connects them, allowing for their unparalleled cohesion and coordination in battle.

Unlike the greenskins this field did not come with the added bonus of protection against warp predators and the corruption of chaos. This proved to be troublesome for the early protheans who had to contend with many daemonic incrusions , eventually as their culture grew to value discipline the attacks lessened both in severity and frequency. However in the warp, the souls of the four eyed xenos were luminos and tempting to the neverborn, drawing in some of the oldest foulest creatures that were motivated enough to break through any geller shielding.

This meant that warp travel was suicidal for the protheans and it seemed their expansion would stop before it began. But a solution was found : element Zero. The material was abundant on the nameless planet the protheans called home and wasn't seen as useful for anything other than randomly causing biotic potential. But a brilliant prothean scientist managed to create the first Eezo drive -based on how biotic used their vanguard abilities.

This new form of FTL allowed for the protheans to rapidly expand unchecked by the whimsical tides of the warp though mass effect ships were slower and their eezo requirements meant they were smaller, at least at first and until numerous bountiful deposits were found.

Their bitterness at being abandoned by their "gods " led them to becoming imperialists that conquered any species they encountered with the only choice given is "submit or be broken " .

In a relatively short time their empire had grown exponentially but it was still dwarfed in magnitudes by the eldar empire in all aspects which the protheans discovered in the 49th millennium PF (preceding the Fall.

The Orvaroes were a resource hungry and expansionist species , always looking for more planets to colonize and exploit and they were doing just that on a planet that would later be known as Thessia.

Unknown to them it was also discover by Prothean probes, months prior and a colonization fleet was on the way, which was accompanied by a similarly sized defense flotilla (incredibly costly but the four-eyed species spared no expense to ensure speedy interstellar growth). The Orvarion colonists were given the choice to kneel. They refused and where killed to a man and the survivors forced into indentured servitude.

The Orvarians were furious and relayed these events to their eldar masters , the eldar retaliated, not out of an concern or real outrage but out of curiosity and boredom.

The Aldarei contacted the protheans and demanded that the protheans either submit or be exterminated and the protheans chose to resist much to the knife ears delight who found a new source of entertainment.

The Protheans in their arrogance believed themselves to be above all other species and that their destiny was to tame the cosmos to their will and faced the eldar with the belief the Eldar, who had usurped their right, would be defeated quickly.

They were wrong.


End file.
